Review: ‘The Punisher’

With origins in a Marvel Comics character, The Punisher is, as might be expected, two-dimensional. The Punisher has killed 125 people before the film even begins, and the ensuing 90 minutes are crammed with slaughters of every conceivable kind. Pic was the only product of the New World offshoot Down Under.

With origins in a Marvel Comics character, The Punisher is, as might be expected, two-dimensional. The Punisher has killed 125 people before the film even begins, and the ensuing 90 minutes are crammed with slaughters of every conceivable kind. Pic was the only product of the New World offshoot Down Under.

Story involves an ex-cop whose wife and children were murdered by the mafia in New York. He hides from civilization in the city’s sewers and for five years he’s been killing the various heads of the mob families in nonstop vengeance.

Another party comes to play – the Japanese mafia headed by the glamorous, stony cold Lady Tanaka. The Punisher is quite content to see his enemies slaughter each other until the Japanese kidnap the locals’ children.

Dolph Lundgren looks just as if he’s stepped out of a comic book. Thankfully, he breezes through the B-grade plot with tongue firmly placed in cheek.